It was a historic moment when Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav pressed the button of the Piling Rig machine at the 32 PAC Battalion grounds on Friday to formally inaugurate the civil construction work of the priority section of the first phase of lucknow Metro.
The city of Nawabs till now known for its tonga rides took a giant leap in the process of development with the lucknow Metro moving from a project on paper to an on ground reality. The Chief Minister stressed that this was only the beginning and metros will be start in three cities of the state soon. He declared confidently that the project will be completed by December 2016 before the next Vidhan Sabha elections.
The inaugural programme which was organized by the lucknow Metro Rail Corporation was telecast live at several points of the city which included Gomtinagar, Golf Culb, Hazratganj and Charbagh.
A very confident Akhilesh Yadav very categorically pointed out that with this step was a pointer to all his detractors who had been labeling him as the Worst Chief Minister and what his Government had achieved in a span of two and half years, no other State Government had accomplished.
Expressing his gratitude to the Metroman E Sreedharan under whose guidance it was possible to speed up the projectm the Chief Minister said, “This inauguration is taking place on the auspicious occasion of Navratras. Samajwadi Supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav on March 3 had on the same grounds at the inaugural of the depo specified the deadline when the project would be completed and we are confident that we would complete the project before the next Vidhan Sabha Elections. There are several cities in other states where the metro project never took off even after it was announced however we will complete it by December 2016” said the Chief Minister.
He said that this was only the starting and the state will witness Metros in three other cities. “No other State Government can boast of three metros in their state. lucknow has a vast population which is on the increase and Metro is the need of the hour. The lucknow Metro will also provide employment to several people in the city apart from the much required ease in traffic” said the Chief Minister. He said that while they were working on Metro they were simultaneously emphasizing on the cycle track keeping in mind the varying needs of the people.
The Chief Minister said that the other projects were also moving ahead with the same speed which included the Agra lucknow Expressway for which they were getting a lot of cooperation from the farmers.
Hinting at the various hurdles that they would face while completing the projects, the Chief Minister in a lighter vein said, “A journalist asked me recently what was my hobby and I told him that I was trying to be happy. With the launching of the civil construction work all those questions that had been raised questioning my capability have been answered and in the two and a half years the State Government has proved itself,” he said.